


how can we go back to the beginning?

by onceuponawar



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: 3x07, Episode Tag, F/M, SnowBarry - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-21
Updated: 2017-06-21
Packaged: 2018-11-17 02:23:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 670
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11265969
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/onceuponawar/pseuds/onceuponawar
Summary: “I'm sorry for kissing you,” Caitlin says eventually and a laugh erupts from him unexpectedly. He wheels his chair closer to her, lays a hand on her forearm and attempts to catch her downcast eye.“I probably would've enjoyed it more if you hadn't been trying to kill me.”[3x07 episode tag]





	how can we go back to the beginning?

**Author's Note:**

> Because I needed an expansion on what happened in 3x07; sorry for the shortness!

She grasped for a moment at the metal power dampening cuffs, which were cold to the touch. But then again, everything was cold to the touch nowadays. It wasn't the objects her fingers grazed, it was her; she'd never feel anything but cold again.

In a split second, she unlocks them and allows Cisco’s creation to clatter to the floor unceremoniously. Immediately, even without so much as a movement, her hands begin to crawl with sharp shards of ice. Thin tendrils of cold air wind themselves across her palm and fall off her fingertips; floating away. 

In the doorframe behind her, Barry lurked, watching as she let the power swirl and twist every which way. She doesn't need to turn to know he's there. “I'll never be able to use it to help people.”

Barry pulls his hands out of his pockets, wanders away from the doorway and sits in the chair across from her. It feels weird, thinking about how only two days ago they'd sat in this exact position after she had revealed her Killer Frost powers to the team. So much had happened since then; too much. “We don't know that yet. Maybe eventually you'll be able to get…” He gestures to his eyes, struggling for a word to call the murderous tendency that takes over when she tries to embrace her powers.

“Her?” She fills in. It doesn’t deserve a name, just a pronoun; foreboding, as it should be.

“Yes,” he admits. “Her. Maybe one day you'll be able to use your powers without her taking over. If anyone can do it, Caitlin, you can. I can't imagine you'd be given this gift but then not be able to do what you do best with it: help people.”

Caitlin looks up at him and smiles softly as a quiet falls over her office. She picks the handcuffs back up and slips them over her wrists and slowly but surely the frigid air stops blossoming from her fingertips. The silence doesn't feel the same as it has in times past, he notices, they've shifted somehow since her Killer Frost episode.

They sit like that for a long time, not quite meeting each other's gaze, all the unsaid things hanging in the air between them. Barry, though, doesn't feel the need to fill this silence, in a way it's almost comforting, just knowing that she is there.

“I'm sorry for kissing you,” Caitlin says eventually and a laugh erupts from him unexpectedly. He wheels his chair closer to her, lays a hand on her forearm and attempts to catch her downcast eye.

“I probably would've enjoyed it more if you hadn't been trying to kill me.”

That gets her head flying up so fast that he has to zip backward to avoid being hit in the nose. Immediately a feeling of guilt runs through him. He's dating Iris, he reminds himself. He's dating her and he loves her, he has since he was eleven. He shouldn't be going around telling other girls that he would enjoy kissing them under non-life threatening circumstances.

Even when it’s Caitlin. Even if it isn't a lie. Both of which scare him out of his mind.

Now the silence is something different. It’s not just words and apologies unsaid, but feelings too, big ones Barry doesn’t want to deal with, not now. Someday, when Caitlin isn’t being ruled by her powers and he doesn’t feel like the entire world is on his shoulders; maybe then he can admit what he feels every time they touch. But that day is not today, he knows. 

So instead he stands and offers her his hand. She looks down at her own before tentatively lacing her fingers through his. The soft smile that grows on her face when he doesn't flinch at her cold palm, instead vibrating slightly to warm both of their hands up, is something of hers he'd missed and it makes his heart warm. 

Whatever is between them, he knows, is worth the wait.


End file.
